I Can Really Move

I can understand if people don’t believe me when I am being somewhat creative with the truth, but it really bothers me when no one believes me if I am telling the truth and nothing but the truth, so help me God.

Kids are awful for asking difficult questions and I guess I was awful for answering them. It wouldn’t have been so bad if I had known the correct answers I suppose, but I still contend that most of my answers were far more interesting that the right ones. For instance, one of the kids (I think it was the smart one) asked why leaves are green. I actually knew this one. It has something to do with the plants creating chlorophyll during the process of photosynthesis...blah, blah, blah.

What I said was that a long time ago before people and before animals there were only plants on the earth, and they had all of the colours in the rainbow. It was really very beautiful, much more so than now. Back then the sky was much bigger than it is now and once, it actually touched the sun! You remember from art class that when you mix blue and yellow you get green, and that is exactly what happened when the sun and sky met. The green from the sky fell to the earth and was absorbed by the dirt, and ever since then plants have been green. Every fall you can see some of the true colours of the plants, because most of the green has been used up. I wouldn’t be surprised if this year or next all of the plants once again became rainbow coloured.

Nice story, but the funny thing about kids is that they tell other people things that they “know”. Shortly after this, they stopped asking me questions, and turned to their mother for answers. I still have the grandkids!

Once, I went on a date and I was driving my dad’s car. It was one of those magical winter nights, with beautiful big snowflakes. You know the kind, if you catch one on your tongue you don’t have to eat for a week. Unfortunately for me these flakes turned to ice as soon as they hit pavement and on the way home from my girlfriends (doing 10 MPH) I turned the steering wheel and although the wheels turned, the car didn’t turn! To my surprise, slamming into a curb can really damage a car, and driving home with a bent “whatever” isn’t good for the car either. The mechanic told dad that I had to be doing about 50 to do that kind of damage. I guess the axle and frame were bent. Fuckin’ mechanic! I didn’t drive for months. As God is my witness, I was doing 10 MPH and dad thought that I was a liar till the day he died. I hope he is reading this now. Nah, he still wouldn’t believe me.

I was hanging out on the boardwalk in Florida with a buddy and for some reason he screamed very loud and shrilly. Strangely enough, at that precise moment a car with some hoods that were looking for trouble were driving by and I saw the brake lights go on and they reversed back to where we were. Not having done anything wrong we just stood there talking. The hoods got out of the car and said “Who yelled?” My buddy said that he had yelled, and the hood that was standing in front of him, knocked him to the ground. It was kind of like watching one of those inflatable punching clowns; he hit the ground and bounced right back up. His feet were moving like a cartoon characters and he took off. The hoods looked at me and I think my legs started to run before my brain told them to. Got to love that adrenaline!

I mention this story to establish my credentials regarding hoods in cars and running. It was a few months later that something similar happened on a hot night in Scarborough. My friends and I were sitting on the curb talking and laughing when a car went by and someone in the car yelled something incoherent.  I yelled back “Fuck you!” and said to my friends “Get ready to run.”...”RUN”. I didn’t look back, I didn’t think of anything but running down the cut through. I did warn them. The next thing I remember was laying facedown in long grass by the railroad tracks.

Now, as I lay there I wasn’t feeling all that brave. Against my better judgement I got up and retraced my steps, knowing that I was headed to a certain beating. When I got there, my friends were all unhurt and telling the story of how the thugs didn’t believe that anyone could have run fast enough to be out of sight by the time they got out of the car. Rob told the girls to go up to the house and when one of the thugs said “We don’t hit girls.” Rob took off like a gazelle. I guess they started to believe when Don was doubled over in laughter instead of pain and fear. The thugs swore at them, got back in the car and left.

To this day they insist that I didn’t say “Get ready to run.”...”RUN”. How can they all be so wrong? Well, at least I know that in a pinch, I can really move.